Where doubts pay off: Kevin Chong on trading his writing life for the racetrack

The television is turned to Will Rogers Downs at Cherokee Casino, in Tulsa, Okla., where in the first race of the afternoon a four-year-old thoroughbred named Sargent Marv is the favourite with 2-1 odds. Kevin Chong flips through the race guide, studying the numbers. He’s sitting in a booth at Turf Lounge, an off-track wagering site in the heart of Toronto’s financial district, though at this early afternoon hour the investment bankers and lawyers seem more preoccupied with food than horses. In the end, Chong declines to place a bet. Despite a late rally, Sargent Marv finishes third to a longshot named One Room School and a horse named Sequoia Charm.

“I second guess everything,” Chong admits, later, over lunch. He can read the numbers well enough to identify the favourites in each race without looking at the odds, but it’s not the advantage one might assume. “I have the same information as what you would get by looking at the favourites. I have enough to give me crippling self-doubt.”

Doubt, of both the personal and professional kind, is explored in Chong’s new book, My Year of the Racehorse, which chronicles the 36-year-old Vancouver writer’s brief flirtation with the sport of kings. A few years ago, Chong invested a book advance into a horse named Mocha Time, affectionately known as Blackie, a stubborn five-year-old mare that raced at Vancouver’s Hastings racetrack.

“It’s kind of funny this relationship you have with a racehorse,” he says. “Because in some ways it’s really abstract. You pay a cheque, and all of a sudden you pin your hopes and dreams on it, and take credit for its accomplishments, and the accomplishments of the trainers. It’s kind of a strange concept.”

For Chong, owning a horse represented something greater than winning or losing; as he watched his friends buy houses and start families, Chong was left wondering what he had to show for his accomplishments — which include three previous books. Mocha Time, in some ways, was his mortgage, though one that might try and bite him if he ventured too close.

“The horse was pretty indifferent to me,” Chong says. “Eventually, you realize that your relationship with your horse might just be one-sided.

“I think our relationships with animals often are one-sided,” he adds, and this is especially true with racehorses. “They’re like stocks.”

The value of which, it seems, almost always decreases. (“The people who own horses? They aren’t doing it to make money,” Chong says.) It’s an expensive sport, purely in terms of upkeep, so even the most successful owners must be willing to invest their winnings back into their horses and trainers.

It’s not a spoiler to reveal Chong no longer owns a racehorse; after all, the book is called My Year of the Racehorse. In the end, Blackie did not break down on the track, nor did Chong part ways with his friend after a final, thrilling victory. Instead, Blackie was “claimed” by another owner while racing in Portland, Ore., (the fact that horses can be claimed at almost any time by another owner just underlines how much like stocks these animals are). Chong reinvested in another horse, but that one was unable to compete due to injury. These days, Chong is horseless.

“I miss owning a horse,” he says. “I miss being in a winner’s photo. I miss inviting my friends out to the track. I’d like to own a horse again.”

More than that, Chong hopes the sport recaptures some of its former popularity. Horse racing has seen better days; even Luck, HBO’s much-anticipated show about the sport, only lasted a handful of episodes before it was cancelled, and might have done more harm than good when it comes to repairing the sport’s image. Chong likens it to poker, which languished for years until the combination of television and James McManus’s book Positively Fifth Street propelled it back into the public’s imagination.

“The track’s a little bit more difficult than Texas Hold ’em, but at the same time much more interesting,” he says. “It’s not like poker, where it’s just guys with mirrored sunglasses sitting in a dark room, eating chips. These are real athletes who put their lives on the line. There’s a lot to it.

“It’s sort of like publishing, newspapers, rock ’n’ roll. It’s sort of got this past it has to live up to. And maybe it should just ignore the past and just try to make the best of the present.”